Pro. Jake Delhomme

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PHILADELPHIA -- With 1 minute, 35 seconds remaining in their second matchup of the season against the vaunted Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ defense, and without running back Stephen Davis, the Carolina Panthers needed to drive 78 yards for the go-ahead score.

At the helm of the charge down the field was quarterback Jake Delhomme, who at the start of the season was backing up 15-year veteran Rodney Peete, a former Eagle. It appeared to be a situation that had failure written all over it.

But the fifth-year player from Louisiana-Lafayette did what has become his trademark in his first season as an NFL starting quarterback: Engineer a comeback.

Going 5-for-6 on the drive and completing a 5-yard touchdown pass to receiver Steve Smith with 1:06 to go to give the Panthers the lead and the season sweep of the Bucs, Delhomme not only won a football game but a locker room of support.

"That was the big turning point for the team believing in me," said Delhomme, who had previously served as Aaron Brooks’ backup in New Orleans before signing with Carolina as an unrestricted free agent in the offseason.

As the most unheralded of the four quarterbacks remaining in the hunt, Delhomme has quietly led an offense more known for its running attack than its aerial fireworks.

Entering the NFC Championship Game with the Eagles, Delhomme’s quarterbacking rating of 100.8 is second only to Colts’ Peyton Manning near-perfect 156.9 mark. His 563 passing yards puts him atop the NFC.

In last week’s victory over St. Louis, Delhomme was at his best during the overtime periods, going 5-for-8 with 136 yards and the 69-yard, game-winning touchdown pass to Smith on the first play of the second extra session.

While the results of Delhomme’s progression are now being seen on the national stage, the only quarterback in Panthers’ history beside Steve Beuerlein to throw for 3,000 yards in a season has had the full support of head coach John Fox since being inserted into the lineup.

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CHRIS STUCHKO , Special to The Times

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Undrafted QB has paid his NFL dues

PHILADELPHIA—There's much ado in these parts about the local Eagles' rebound this season from injuries, Rush Limbaugh and fourth-and-26. But there's a fellow on the other side of the ball living a story that's every bit as compelling.

He's the unlikely answer to today's pop quiz, actually, the one that asks you to name the Louisiana-born quarterback who led the NFL in game-winning, final-possession drives this season.

It's not Peyton Manning.

You da man, Jake Delhomme. Eight times he's won games on his last touch of the pigskin, including last week in double overtime in St.Louis to earn a trip to this NFC Championship game. Still, Delhomme (Duh-LOAM, you say) is the most unlikely of generals left standing among the NFL's final four.

Manning and Donovan McNabb have the experience and the big dough.

Tom Brady wins, including a big fat Super Bowl ring. Along comes Delhomme, who started the season carrying a clipboard and is finishing it by showing each week a little more moxie than he did in the last. Which has been the story of his career.

Here's a guy who put up state-record numbers at Louisiana-Lafayette — yet didn't hear his name called come NFL draft day. A guy who grew up in a little town named Breaux Bridge, in the heart of the Bayou, and married the only girl he ever dated, starting in Grade 7. A guy whose father trains thoroughbred horses, including a string of six that he owns with his brother.

Unlike those other three in this exclusive corner, there have been no large contracts, early expectations and attendant pressure — or opportunity.

He made the New Orleans Saints as a free-agent invite to a minicamp, then spent his first season on their practice squad. The Saints sent him overseas, where he couldn't even crack the starting lineup of the mighty Amsterdam Admirals.

"You talk about a blow to your ego," Delhomme says. "I mean, if you can't start in the NFL Europe, how are you going to make a roster?"

Mind you, the Admirals' starter was Kurt Warner. And yeah, that was Rams star-turned-backup Warner on the sideline last Sunday, watching as Delhomme and the Panthers celebrated. Like Warner's grocery-boy story of a few years back, this is a case of a guy paying his dues, from Delhomme's NFL Europe title in 1998 to part-time status with the Saints (86 passes thrown in five seasons coming into this year), and finally the Panthers saw enough to offer him a two-year, $4 million (U.S.) contract that has paid off hugely.

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The Toronto Star
CHRIS YOUNG
AT THE NFC CHAMPIONSHIP

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Jake Delhomme of the Carolina Panthers doesn’t have the high profile of the three other starting quarterbacks left in the NFL playoffs, but he fits the mold of quarterbacks who’ve come from nowhere to win recent Super Bowls.

Super Bowl titles once seemed the province of star quarterbacks like Terry Bradshaw, Joe Montana and John Elway. Not lately.

Kurt Warner, formerly of the Arena Football League and NFL Europe, was an anonymous backup in St. Louis until Trent Green was hurt during the 1999 preseason and Warner took the Rams to the title. He was Super Bowl MVP.

In 2001, second-year man Tom Brady replaced injured Drew Bledsoe and led the New England Patriots to the championship. He, too, was Super Bowl MVP.

In the 2000 season, Baltimore won it all with Trent Dilfer. Last season, Brad Johnson quarterbacked Tampa Bay. Not overnight sensations, but they weren’t Bradshaw and Montana, either.

In today’s NFC title game, Delhomme matches up against Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb. In the AFC: Peyton Manning of the Indianapolis Colts and Brady of the Patriots.

Delhomme spent six seasons with New Orleans as a backup and practice squad player. He played in NFL Europe with the Amsterdam Admirals (backup to Warner) and Frankfurt Galaxy (which he led to the 1999 World Bowl title).

He acknowledges he is odd man out among the quarterbacks left.

“Certainly, those guys have earned that right, starting with this guy we’re playing this week (McNabb). He’s fabulous. ... He’s been doing it for a few years now,” says Delhomme.

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Gannett News Sevice
The Associated Press

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Panthers' Delhomme tries to join NFL's big-name QBs

PHILADELPHIA -- Three of the four quarterbacks who will start today's conference championship games have names straight off an "NFL Who's Who" list.

The fourth is more of a "Who's That?" Outside of Charlotte, N.C., Jake Delhomme seldom sees his name in print without an accompanying pronunciation guide (DUH-lome).

Delhomme wasn't drafted out of a big-time college program. He doesn't have the gaudy stats of the Indianapolis Colts' Peyton Manning, the playoff resumé of the New England Patriots' Tom Brady or the all-around athletic ability of the Philadelphia Eagles' Donovan McNabb, his counterpart in the NFC Championship game.

What Delhomme, 29, has is the complete confidence of his coaches and teammates as he tries to lead the Carolina Panthers to the Super Bowl in his first season as their starting quarterback.

"Jake has been doing an awesome job. He's playing above himself," said wide receiver Muhsin Muhammad, who joins kicker John Kasay as the only players remaining from the 1996 Carolina team that lost 30-13 to Green Bay in the NFC Championship game. "Over the course of the season, he has gotten better and better and better."

Delhomme began the season as the backup to veteran Rodney Peete. That lasted only until halftime of the first game when Delhomme came off the bench and rallied the Panthers from a 17-0 deficit to a 24-23 victory over Jacksonville.

"The rest," coach John Fox said Friday, "is history."

And it's a history that just keeps adding chapters.

Since leading the Panthers to an 11-5 regular-season finish, including an NFL-best seven wins when his team was tied or trailing in the fourth quarter, Delhomme has excelled in playoff wins against Dallas (29-10) and St. Louis (29-23). He is a combined 34-of-55 for 563 yards and two touchdowns, including a 69-yarder to wide receiver Steve Smith last week that beat the Rams in double overtime.

Those are heady numbers for a quarterback no one wanted in the 1997 draft despite his 9,216 yards and 64 touchdowns as a four-year starter at his hometown Louisiana-Lafayette. He signed with New Orleans as a free agent and spent the next six years bouncing between NFL Europe and the Saints' bench.

He thought of quitting in 1998 when the Saints sent him to Amsterdam and he wound up on the bench there. He couldn't know then that losing the job to Kurt Warner wasn't such a bad thing.

"Talk about a blow to your ego," he said. "I mean, if you can't start in NFL Europe, how are you going to make (an NFL) roster?"

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By Steve Ballard
steve.ballard@indystar.com

January 18th, 2004, 02:17 pm #235

Turbine

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I think/hope the lessons learned against the running quarterbacks of Dallas, Philly, and Atlanta in successive weeks (all losses) will help against McNabb this time around.

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January 18th, 2004, 06:28 pm #236

Turbine

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Delhomme to Moose M. TD

Panthers 7
Eagles 0

Geaux Cajuns

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January 18th, 2004, 07:18 pm #237

Turbine

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Jake up at the half 7-3

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January 18th, 2004, 08:44 pm #238

Turbine

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Jake has a quarterback rating of over 109 and is headed to theSUPERBOWL

Geaux Cajuns

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January 18th, 2004, 08:46 pm #239

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ps Jake wins 14-3

Geaux Cajuns

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January 18th, 2004, 08:55 pm #240

CajunFanatic91

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Ragin Cajuns of Louisiana Geaux Cajuns

Jake Is Goin' To The Super Bowl!

GEAUX JAKE! GEAUX JAKE! GEAUX JAKE! LOUISIANA HAS PRODUCED A LEGEND!

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[Turbine]

I think/hope the lessons learned against the running quarterbacks of Dallas, Philly, and Atlanta in successive weeks (all losses) will help against McNabb this time around.

[Turbine]

Delhomme to Moose M. TD

Panthers 7
Eagles 0

[Turbine]

Jake up at the half 7-3

[Turbine]

Jake has a quarterback rating of over 109 and is headed to theSUPERBOWL

[Turbine]

ps Jake wins 14-3

[CajunFanatic91]

GEAUX JAKE! GEAUX JAKE! GEAUX JAKE! LOUISIANA HAS PRODUCED A LEGEND!